USB 250GB drive and WinME

  • Thread starter Thread starter WaltA
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WaltA

I have just bought a Freecom Classic SL 250GB external
(USB) HD It installs and runs (OK so far :) ) with WindowsME
& displays in Explorer as a 232GB drive G.

I have read that WinME does not recognise drives greater
than 132(?) GB
Does that apply only to _internal_ drives ?

Is Explorer telling me a true story, ie. it can see a drive
bigger than 130 on my USB port. or is it telling porkies that
may come to bite me later ?
In other words is the Freecom internals taking care of the
132G barrier

The box says that it is suitable for WinME etc.

Supplementary question : Am I correct to assume that
the difference between 250GB and 232GB is due to the
formatting/ file system overheads and/or binaryGigs ?


PS SiSoftSandra also says 232GB

TIA
 
I have just bought a Freecom Classic SL 250GB external
(USB) HD It installs and runs (OK so far :) ) with WindowsME
& displays in Explorer as a 232GB drive G.

I have read that WinME does not recognise drives greater
than 132(?) GB
Does that apply only to _internal_ drives ?

Is Explorer telling me a true story, ie. it can see a drive
bigger than 130 on my USB port. or is it telling porkies that
may come to bite me later ?
In other words is the Freecom internals taking care of the
132G barrier

The box says that it is suitable for WinME etc.

Supplementary question : Am I correct to assume that
the difference between 250GB and 232GB is due to the
formatting/ file system overheads and/or binaryGigs ?


PS SiSoftSandra also says 232GB

TIA
Click to expand...

Ooops, I forgot to say :
"> or is it telling porkies that"
">may come to bite me later ....

.....when I start filling it up past the 132GB region ?


Thanks.
 
WaltA said:
I have just bought a Freecom Classic SL 250GB external
(USB) HD It installs and runs (OK so far :) ) with WindowsME
& displays in Explorer as a 232GB drive G.
Click to expand...
I have read that WinME does not recognise drives greater
than 132(?) GB
Does that apply only to _internal_ drives ?
Correct.

Is Explorer telling me a true story, ie. it can
see a drive bigger than 130 on my USB port.
Click to expand...

Yep, with some 'lost' due to the fact that the hard
drive manufacturer quotes the size in decimal GBs
and Win mostly reports it in binary GBs, and due
to some being used by the directory structures etc.
 
98/98SE/ME have problems with data at 128GB and more on one physical hard
drive. Note that I did not mention anything about partitions in this
statement.

There should be no problem in any seeing such a physical hard drive if the
onboard bios or external drive enclosure interface presents that info to the
OS. And, if the partitioning software can handle such a hard drive or the
size partition(s) desired, should be no problem either.
 
Jim said:
98/98SE/ME have problems with data at 128GB and more on one physical hard
drive.
Click to expand...

No, they don't.
The problem is in the IDE/SATA drivers or rather the lack of IDE/SATA
driver support, not the OS.
Note that I did not mention anything about partitions in this statement.
Click to expand...

Neither did you say anything about IDE or SATA or SCSI or USB or Firewire
either. Thanks for telling us the total uselessness of that first statement.
There should be no problem in any seeing such a physical hard drive if the on
board bios or external drive enclosure interface presents that info to the OS.
Click to expand...

Not without a capable driver.
 
Jim said:
98/98SE/ME have problems with data at 128GB
Click to expand...

NOT WITH EXTERNAL USB DRIVES.
and more on one physical hard drive.
Click to expand...

Complete and utter drivel.
Note that I did not mention anything about partitions in this statement.
Click to expand...
There should be no problem in any seeing such a physical
hard drive if the onboard bios or external drive enclosure
interface presents that info to the OS.
Click to expand...

Very confusing way of answering his question.
 
On Tue, 6 Dec 2005 15:39:13 +1100, Rod & I wrote:
snip

thanks very much Rod.
very reassuring, ta.
 
98/98SE/ME have problems with data at 128GB and more on one physical hard
drive. Note that I did not mention anything about partitions in this
statement.

There should be no problem in any seeing such a physical hard drive if the
onboard bios or external drive enclosure interface presents that info to the
OS. And, if the partitioning software can handle such a hard drive or the
size partition(s) desired, should be no problem either.
Click to expand...

Ummm, I'm still trying to work this out, :-!)), as it applies to me,
are you giving me background about the various problems that
may arise from time to time under various circumstances ? But
that in my particular case you think that my Explorer is seeing my
USB device correctly and you agree with Rod's analysis ??
 
"Jim" wrote
Click to expand...
Neither did you say anything about IDE or SATA or SCSI or USB or Firewire
either. Thanks for telling us the total uselessness of that first statement.
Click to expand...

Gentlemen, please !
Jim > can you you expand ?
Folkert > tranquiliser pill !

I did in fact wonder about partitioning to two drives of about
100ishGB
but the last time I messed with fdisk was many moons ago
when I upgraded from a 10M drive to a 20M drive with that most
advanced of operating systems DOS3 ! :)

Now fdisk looks well confusing and methinks my brain needs
a defrag first before I try to remember all that !
 
Very confusing way of answering his question.
Click to expand...

Yep,
ur right,
I was a tad confusled by that !

If I had known how to interrogate my bios or my ext. enc. if.
(and my os)** then nodoubt I would not be here seeking
enlightenment
instead I'd be earnining millions competeing with Bill

:-(


Or even a valid test proceedure to validate my drive above
130summatGB without having to empirically fill it up ,,,,,
at USB1.1 !?
oh I'm going to bed,
nightnite
 
WaltA said:
statement. statement.

Gentlemen, please !
Jim > can you you expand ?
Folkert > tranquiliser pill !

I did in fact wonder about partitioning to two drives of about
100ishGB
but the last time I messed with fdisk was many moons ago
when I upgraded from a 10M drive to a 20M drive with that most
advanced of operating systems DOS3 ! :)

Now fdisk looks well confusing and methinks my brain needs
a defrag first before I try to remember all that !
Click to expand...

Will copy it to this reply. Nothing to expand on. It applies to any
ide/scsi/usb/firewire interface:
"98/98SE/ME have problems with data at 128GB and more on one physical hard
drive. Note that I did not mention anything about partitions in this
statement."
 
Jim said:
Will copy it to this reply.
Click to expand...

And yet another ostrich.
Nothing to expand on.
Click to expand...

You just did :
It applies to any ide/scsi/usb/firewire interface:
Wrong.

"98/98SE/ME have problems with data at 128GB and more on one physical hard
drive. Note that I did not mention anything about partitions in this statement."
Click to expand...

And still as wrong as the first time. The 128GB does apply
to FAT32 partitions for some Windowses but not ME:

" In Windows Me, using a cluster size of 32 KB, a FAT32 volume
can theoretically be about 8 terabytes. However, the 32-bit fields
in the partition table (and in the FAT32 boot sector) limit the size
of an individual volume (regardless of file system) on a basic MBR
disk using a sector size of 512 bytes to approximately 2 terabytes"

The 128GiB *physical* addressing limit (using 28-bit addressing)
only exists in IDE/SATA drives/controllers/bridges,
*not SCSI* , *not USB* and not *Firewire*.
 
WaltA said:
Yep, ur right, I was a tad confusled by that !

If I had known how to interrogate my bios or my ext. enc. if.
(and my os)** then nodoubt I would not be here seeking enlight-

:-(


Or even a valid test proceedure to validate my drive above
130summatGB without having to empirically fill it up ,,,,, at USB1.1 !?
Click to expand...

Just read the first sector above the 137GB limit.
If you find a copy of the Master Boot Record there, then there is a
problem. Svend Olaf Mikkelsen's GB32 program may do that for you.

http://www.partitionsupport.com/utilities.htm
 
Will copy it to this reply. Nothing to expand on.
Click to expand...

Restating drivel doesnt turn it into anything useful.
It applies to any ide/scsi/usb/firewire interface:
"98/98SE/ME have problems with data at 128GB
and more on one physical hard drive.
Click to expand...

That is just plain wrong, most obviously with multiple IDE
drives and externals over 128G with the exception of sata.
 
Jim said:
Read the caution note on the bottom.
Click to expand...

Contents of which you obviously are completely unable to comprehend.
My tests show the same.
http://www.48bitlba.com/win98.htm
Click to expand...

Utterly clueless.

"The hard drives will work properly because updated Windows drivers
are installed which provide 48-bit LBA support with Windows 98 or Me"

The same caution applies to NT, W2k, XP and any other thinkable OS
that needs enabled drivers to use 48-bit LBA on ATA/SATA drives
directly connected to host bus adapters (IDE/SATA controllers).
It does not apply to anything else, not even ATAPI.

The real issue is whether such drivers exist for the OS, nothing to do
with the OS capability itself.

Oh, and non 48-bit enabled drivers don't necessarily corrupt your data.
It's only the buggy ones that look at the 48-bit supported capacity
and then use the 28-bit command set without even checking whether
the 28-bit address ceiling is penetrated. There are several failsafes
in ATA that must have been disabled/ignored in those drivers.

Older drivers that never knew of 48-bit LBA shouldn't have a problem
as the 48-bit related values have different addresses within the identify
sector and the standard addresses still contain 28-bit limited values.
 
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